Germany Guide
The Black Forest
The Friedrichsbad and Römische Badruinen
Address: Bäderviertel
Opening time: Friedrichsbad daily 9am–10pm, last entry 8pm
Telephone: 07221/27 59 20
Website: www.roemisch-irisches-bad.de
The narrow alleys at the northeastern end of the Altstadt open up to reveal the large buildings and parkland of the Bäderviertel (Baths Quarter). Baths were established here by the Romans in around 75 AD, as part of their town Aquae Aureliae, as local spring waters were thought to ease aching joints. Something of this time can still be seen in the Römische Badruinen, Römerstrasse 11 (mid-March to mid-Nov daily 11am–1pm & 2–5pm; €2), where the ancient bathhouses are preserved – computer animation provides a reconstruction to help make sense of the crumbling walls you can see from raised floors above them. The ruins are hidden in the basement of the famous Friedrichsbad, the undisputed queen of German spas. By happy coincidence the wraps came off the splendid neo-Renaissance bathing hall five years after Kaiser Wilhelm I outlawed gambling in 1872, and the baths cashed in on the casino's temporary halt. And just as Bénazet had brought opulence to local gambling, so Grand Duke Friedrich I's spa elevated bathing. Outside, the Friedrichsbad looks like a minor palace, fronted by busts of Baden-Baden spa heroes including Friedrich I crowned with green copper cupolas; inside it is a paean to a golden age of antiquity, a colonnaded beauty of elegant arches and columns in tones of terracotta and stone. Speciality of the house is the Roman-Irish bath (€21, or €29 including a brush massage; towel rental included), a three-hour-long course of showers, baths, steam rooms and saunas of ever-decreasing temperatures. By stage ten, you drift dazed in a pool, watched by a ring of cherubs on an ornamented cupola; at stage sixteen you collapse, prune-like and dozy, in a resting area for a snooze. As Twain noted, "Here at the Friedrichsbad you lose track of time within ten minutes and the world within twenty." Leave your inhibitions at the door, however – bathing is mixed (except Mon & Thurs when sexes are segregated) and nude. Children under 14 are not allowed, those over only with parents.